Excession

, #5

Paperback, 455 pages

English language

Published Dec. 2, 1997 by Orbit.

ISBN:
978-1-85723-457-2
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Goodreads:
535060

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4 stars (123 reviews)

Two and a half millennia ago, the artifact appeared in a remote corner of space, beside a trillion-year-old dying sun from a different universe. It was a perfect black-body sphere, and it did nothing. Then it disappeared.

Now it is back.

9 editions

reviewed Excession by Iain M. Banks (Culture, #5)

Space AI drama

3 stars

I liked how the Culture Minds schemed against each other, in the setting of the sudden appearance of a mysterious space artefact that even the superminds had trouble understanding. But with long, random names and lack of characteristics made the "back channel talks", between the Minds, really hard to follow (without taking notes).

The human/alien characters had more life though and their parallel plot was equally interesting and easier to follow.

I was kind of suprised at the near end reveals of both plots and how everyone got a happy ending.

reviewed Excession by Iain M. Banks (Culture, #5)

Best Culture book

5 stars

I believe this to be the best book in Banks' Culture series. It has the core hallmarks of his other novels: great characters & strong prose; it also has the best use of Minds, the Excession, and an unusually well-paced plot. If you had to read one Culture novel, this is the one.

reviewed Excession by Iain M. Banks (Culture, #5)

Excession

5 stars

"Excession" est le cinquième tome du cycle de la Culture de Iain M. Banks. Après le recueil de nouvelles qui constituait le quatrième volume, on retrouve ici un long et très bon roman de science-fiction.

Je dois pourtant dire que j'ai eu un peu de mal à plonger dedans : la multitude de personnages et de factions mises en scène m'a un peu perdu, le récit met un peu de temps à décoller. Même une fois lancé, cela reste parfois confus car les intrigues, mêmes si on sent qu'elles sont liées, sont multiples et pas toujours faciles à suivre. Heureusement, cela est tout de même atténué par la présences des Intelligences Artificielles et notamment les discussions absolument hilarantes qu'elles ont entre elles. Je crois que c'est la première fois que je vois des IA qui soient traitées à ce point comme des personnages à part entière, et c'est vraiment la …

Review of 'Excession' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

I'm a fan of Banks' Culture universe but this book was hard to finish for me.

Culture books, in general, work best when the insane level of technology is a backdrop for a more selective, human story. Excession attempts to follow this formula, but relies too heavily on the detached technological angle and bungles the human one. The main plot line is driven by machines making decisions and communicating with each other, while the human characters are just caught up in their plans. This doesn't sound too different from previous Culture books, but in Consider Phlebas, The Player of Games (or even Use of Weapons which was meh for other reasons) Banks did a better job of creating interesting characters and a plot within the vast and complex universe without the human element feeling vestigial.

This book is only saved by Banks' usual gift for scale, description, and dry humor …

Review of 'Excession' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

This book tickled my fancy. What a strange universe.

War footed aliens, an AI mind conspiracy, a love story gone weird, entanglements aplenty, and oh--an event of such proportion that freaks out a multi-thousand year old Culture. Yea. That'll do.

While I find Banks people-sided stories well writ, composed and read they don't hook me as deep as the science(y) side of events. I like them, but I'm always left going, "What?" Probably because my mind is not a couple thosand years in the future and I don't live in the Culture proper. Or maybe right now I just want more science. I dunno. I like them, but I don't love them.

What I do highly enjoy was the drama of the AI Minds, their deep thought, ponderings, escapisms, and more. To be able to shunt off elements of a mind to interact with people, think on multiple courses of …

Review of 'Excession' on 'LibraryThing'

3 stars

Not the best of the Culture books by a long shot, though it's an interesting addition. I enjoyed the atmosphere of menace and mistrust that builds through the book, and the focus given to all the non-human minds fleshes the Culture out nicely, but the story felt overambitious and overloaded. At times it was seriously hard to follow which of the amusingly-named ships were doing what, with whom, under which pretenses, and after a well-paced build-up for about 3/4 of the book, the last few chapters pulled together a little too quickly to be satisfying.

Review of 'Excession' on 'LibraryThing'

3 stars

Not the best of the Culture books by a long shot, though it's an interesting addition. I enjoyed the atmosphere of menace and mistrust that builds through the book, and the focus given to all the non-human minds fleshes the Culture out nicely, but the story felt overambitious and overloaded. At times it was seriously hard to follow which of the amusingly-named ships were doing what, with whom, under which pretenses, and after a well-paced build-up for about 3/4 of the book, the last few chapters pulled together a little too quickly to be satisfying.

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